VAMPIRES: YOUR STORY FROM 1431 TO TODAY

The legends are often as old as they are: vampires. But where does the belief in the cold creatures come from, when did the first bloodsuckers come from and what makes a real vampire? Read it here!

The story of the vampires


A legend has stuck so stubbornly in people's minds over the centuries as the vampires. Whether as a shy, pale-skinned scary-count, handsome dandy, half-decayed rat-friend or romantic vegetarian vampire - The fascination with the nature of the night is unbroken.

Vampire history lesson. In 1431, in Transylvania Vlad III. born. He received the epithets "Tepes" ("the impostor") and "Draculea" (actually "son of the dragon", but was often misinterpreted from the Romanian as "son of the devil".) Vlad was a particularly cruel warlord and cared for his For example, he is said to have staked a superior army of Ottoman Turks by letting their vanguard sprout alive on large wooden stakes to panic the advancing ones, and the tactic succeeded, and Vlad allegedly fought for a battle His Supper was encircled by dead victims, and his bread occasionally drowned in the blood of the dying, who was assassinated and buried in a monastery near Bucharest in 1477. In 1931, someone opened his grave and found it empty - all these stories inspired him famous vampire author Bram Stoker reportedly used his novel Dracula (1897).

Vampires are no less dangerous. One of the first reports of a female vampire dates back to 1560. At that time, the Hungarian Countess Elisabeth Bathory was born. To remain forever young and beautiful, the nobleman is said to have killed several hundred young girls and then bathed in their virgin blood. In 1610 she was walled into her bedroom and fed only by a crack in the wall. Four years later, the "blood countess" died.

The doubters. Of course, not everyone believed in vampires at the time. For example, in 1755 Gerard van Swieten, personal physician to the Austrian Archduchess Maria Theresia, was sent to Moravia to investigate the vampire cases there. On the basis of his later report - each case being rationalized - the Duchess forbade all traditional vampire defenses, such as stakes, heads, or burning. Pope Benedict XIV (* 1675, † 1758) also considered vampires to be "superstitions." However, faith in the undead is still alive, and it was not until 2005 that the body of a resident of the Romanian village of Marotinu de Sus was unearthed two years earlier He was alleged to be a vampire, but to put an end to it, relatives of the corpse cut out their hearts, burned them, mixed the ashes with water, and drank the brew.

The main vampire features


Characteristics of a vampire. Not every empty grave makes the actual dweller equal to the vampire. To belong to the undead species requires some distinctive features. For vampires it is a matter of being scary. Many undead walk around the numerous stories in their old, human form, feed exclusively on the blood of their tortured victims, have no reflection, shy the sun and therefore sleep during the day in death-like rigidity in coffins. The wooden boxes should preferably stand in the basements of lonely castles. A pale, unhealthy complexion is said to be as much a vampire as the sharp canine teeth, ice-cold skin, and lack of heartbeat - so vampires do not need to breathe.

Invincible. In many stories vampires are attributed supernatural powers. Often they are incredibly fast, strong, can move silently, climb walls, read minds or even turn into animals - preferably in bats. This belief is probably due to the fact that there is actually a bat species in South America that feeds on blood - but mostly on animal blood. One of the few weaknesses of the vampires that the narrators allow them to do is that they often can not cross flowing waters and do not cross a doorstep of a house to which the owner has not expressly invited them.

Eternal life. Another important feature: vampires are reportedly immortal. Eternal life usually gives them wisdom, skill, power, and wealth in the narratives. With their old-fashioned charm, they easily seduce the prettiest women in books and films. They have yet learned to help ladies in the coat, to stop the door for them and to adjust the chair at the table. Despite the many centuries on earth you should not look at the vampires their age. Allegedly, they either do not age at all, or only extremely slowly. If you do, your skin will usually become brighter and more translucent. They literally fade.

What a vampire bite should do


The bite. In one, all stories agree: Vampires bite their victims mostly in the neck, more specifically in the carotid artery - there is the most to get. However, the self-proclaimed experts argue about the effect of a vampire bite. In some narratives, every bitten person automatically becomes a vampire. In other cases, the vampire can control whether the victim joins his species or not. If not, man dies, or becomes a kind of zombie - an involuntary servant of the vampire. Still other authors have determined that the victims must first taste even human blood before the transformation into a vampire begins.

Blood Brothers. So the bite of an undead should not necessarily mean your own farewell. Some vampires are said to let people even taste their own vampire blood. It is supposed to make ordinary mortals healthier and stronger. However, this trust in the human race has probably developed over the centuries. As well as the ability to withstand the sun. Burnt vampires supposedly still at sunrise, they are today often live unnoticed among humans. Likewise, they should have learned to be immune to crosses, holy water, garlic or silver. The most modern variant of vampires should even be able to feed only animal blood, or of synthetically produced blood from bottles.

Put an end to the horror. Only one thing has always remained the same: it should be extremely difficult to kill a vampire. A bullet in the head is not supposed to be enough. Instead, according to the stories, a vampire has to be impaled, beheaded, cut up, or burned - preferably everything together, just to be on the safe side. However, not everyone can manage to actually lift the stake at the crucial moment. Often this is his doom. In some stories but also the beginning of a great love story ...

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